Flat pedal experiment update

For the majority of this season so far I have been on flat pedals on my all mountain bike. I have switched back to clips a couple of times to see if I was missing anything. What I have found is that I usually feel faster on the climbs when I switch back to clips and slower and more timid in the corners. I recently raced one of the friday night super d's with my spd's on and felt like my fitness was good but my skills bad. So today I put the flats back on to see if they would help and found that not only did they help, but I felt no real loss in climbing power. I actually climbed to the peak 7 minutes faster than I did on my last ride with clips. Weird????( I think this had more to do with 2 days rest than pedals) I also felt great down #6 today with the flats and came in under the 21 minute mark, which may be one of my fastest practice runs ever. My next comparison will be at this fridays races as I will be rocking the flats in the SD and hill climb!